


Old friends, like old swords

by CoffeeWithConsequences



Series: Retrouvailles [1]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Anxiety, Anxiety Attacks, Anxiety Disorder, Exes, Friendship, Friendship/Love, M/M, Making Up, Minor Eric Bittle/Jack Zimmermann, Panic, Panic Attacks, Past Kent Parson/Jack Zimmermann, Talking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-22
Updated: 2018-06-22
Packaged: 2019-05-26 23:39:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15011921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CoffeeWithConsequences/pseuds/CoffeeWithConsequences
Summary: With Jack's panic spiraling, he and Kent finally talk some things out.





	Old friends, like old swords

**Author's Note:**

> Warning: There is a very brief mention of suicidal ideology in this story, so please avoid it if that's a trigger for you. There are also several panic attacks, though none are particularly detailed. 
> 
> Thanks so much to [FiaMac](https://archiveofourown.org/users/FiaMac/profile), whose idea launched this.

Jack sighed and ran his fingers through his already messed-up hair. He knew he shouldn’t let the press get to him, but this was getting ridiculous. He’d played a hard-won game, he was tired, he was hungry, and this was taking forever. He tried not to, but he knew he sounded snappish when he replied. “We prepare for any team. Of course we’re watching Kent Parson closely--he’s the league’s leading scorer. But the game on Friday versus the Aces isn’t any different than any other game.”

The next reporter tried again. “You and Kent Parson were on- and off-ice partners in the junior league. Has your relationship changed? Do you come to him for advice about how to handle the NHL, since he’s been here for years?”

That one wasn’t even subtle. Jack took another deep breath. “I haven’t talked to Kent in a while,” he said, sidestepping the question really being asked. “But if I needed advice, I’m sure he could give it. He’s done great things these past few years.” He forced a smile that he knew looked more menacing than friendly. “I really have to go now. Thanks.”

Back in the locker room, Jack felt like all eyes were on him. His heart was beating way too fast, and his breathing wasn’t as smooth as he’d like. _Just get dressed and then get in the truck,_ he told himself. _Just get out of here, and you can call Bitty._

By the time he made it to his truck, Jack was gasping, the panic attack nearly outrunning him. He sat behind the wheel, knuckles white as he gripped it, and tried to count his breaths. When his phone rang, he couldn’t pick it up.

-0-

“It’s getting worse.” Jack usually had trouble being so open with his therapist without a lot of warming up, but he was running out of time to deal with this issue before he met Parse on the ice on Friday. “I had a panic attack last night.”

Kaya nodded and looked at him intently. “Is this about Kent?” She knew the whole story. It had taken months for her to draw it out, but she had all the pieces now. Jack lied to everybody else--his parents, Shitty, even, he was ashamed to admit, Bitty. But Kaya knew.

Jack nodded. “Yeah. The press...won’t stop asking about him. It’s like they’re trying to catch me in something.”

“What do you think they’re trying to catch you doing, Jack? Are you really doing anything wrong?”

Jack shook his head. “No. I know I’m not. But...if you care. If they know you care...it’s blood in the water.”

Kaya was quiet a moment, then asked another question. “Do you think this is about the press finding something out, or is it about Eric?”

Jack frowned. “Eric? What do you mean?”

“You told me before that you were worried, that Eric might find out that your relationship with Kent was more than you’d let on, and that he’d think less of you for it. Is that part of what you’re concerned about now?”

Jack thought for a few minutes before he answered. “Yes,” he finally said. “I think that is part of it. I don’t want Bitty to know I...didn’t tell him the whole truth.”

“Could you tell him now? You said things were going well.”

Jack sighed. “I could. If I knew what to say.”

Kaya was quiet again. “Jack,” she finally said, “you don’t need to answer this, but do you know what your feelings are for Kent Parson, right now?”

Jack didn’t answer

-0-

Time passed whether Jack was ready for it or not, and soon he was on a plane to Las Vegas. He tried to concentrate on the tape he was reviewing on his laptop, watching how the rest of the line moved, but all he could really see was Kent. He’d gotten so much better since they played together. He’d always been a force, but he ran everything now, leading his line with ease Jack never would have expected him to carry. He looked controlled and comfortable--everything Jack wasn’t. It wasn’t just the ridiculous number of pucks he put in the net. Kent was a professional hockey player--a Calder winner, a Stanley Cup champion. Jack was still a scared rookie.

The schedule for Vegas was especially brutal. The game was on Friday night, but the team was staying the weekend in order to attend a Hockey for Hope charity dinner and auction on the Strip. Even without Kent to complicate things, it was the sort of event Jack would do anything to avoid. Unfortunately, Falconers PR had made it clear his attendance was not optional.

 _First the game,_ Jack told himself as the plane finally landed. _Worry about the rest of it later._

When Jack talked to Bitty on Skype that night, he could see the concern in Bitty’s face. “Are you OK, sweetheart? This has to be a little bit weird for you.”

“Sure, Bits. It’s no problem. That was all a long time ago.” Jack hated himself a little bit for giving Bitty what amounted to a press answer, but he couldn’t think of what else to say.

Bitty didn’t buy it, but he didn’t push. “I finished my problem set tonight,” he told Jack. “So I can watch the game at the Haus with the boys tomorrow. We’ll all be cheering for you.” He paused a moment. “We love you, Jack. I love you.”

Jack smiled. No matter how deep he was in his own head, he never got tired of hearing that. “I love you too, bud.”

He didn’t sleep much.

-0-

 _It could have gone worse,_ Jack thought, stripping out of his pads after the game. _We could have lost._ The locker room was boisterous--upsetting a team as good as the Aces was cause for celebration. Jack could barely breathe.

“Zimmboni! Why you have long face?” Tater peered into his space, grinning and already nearly naked. “We win!”

Jack forced a smile. “I know. I’m just tired.” That, at least, was true. He’d taken a couple of rough checks--Vegas played dirty. Everything hurt, and all he wanted was to curl up in a bed. He’d prefer one with Bitty in it, but he was going to have to take what he could get.

“You not going out with us, then?” Tater asked.

Jack shook his head. “Not tonight.”

Tater looked like he wanted to argue, but something in Jack’s face convinced him otherwise. “You are OK?” His eyes were suddenly soft.

Jack nodded. “I’m fine. Thanks.”

Once again, Jack was blessedly able to wait until he was alone to completely freak out. He replayed the whole game in his mind. He hadn’t played too badly--an assist, no big turnovers, no penalties. But Kent was on fire. He’d found the back of the next twice. He hadn’t said a word to Jack. Never even met his eyes.

It was better this way. Better that they avoided each other completely. As he lay in bed, though, trying to get comfortable enough to sleep, he couldn’t stop replaying Kent’s last visit to the Haus. The things he’d said were awful, but even as he said them, Kent’s face told another story. Kent’s hands on Jack’s hips, his lips searching for Jack’s. Jack wanted Kent so much then, even as he told him to leave.

On the ice, tonight, some of that feeling remained. Kent’s hockey had always been beautiful. He and Jack played completely different games, each taught from a young age to play to his strengths and downplay his weaknesses. Kent was fast and graceful and fierce. Jack had completely forgotten was it was like to watch him play.

Complicated feelings weren’t easy for Jack, and the past year had been consumed by his sorting out his feelings for Bitty, as well as his feelings about beginning his delayed professional hockey career. It wasn’t until the past few weeks, when reporters started bringing it up, that he’d thought much about Kent. Once he started, he found it hard to stop, and so many competing emotions wound their way through him that he had no idea where to start teasing them apart.

-0-

Jack was more nervous about the fundraiser than he’d been about the game. No matter how anxious he felt, he knew what to do on the ice. Hockey was simple, clean. The rules never changed. This sort of thing, though Jack had been doing it since he was a kid, was much more complex.

At first, Jack was able to manage it. He wore his nicest suit and smiled and spoke when spoken to. He sipped at a drink and hung behind his teammates. As the night wore on, people invaded his space more, asked more questions, didn’t give him ways out. He spent ten long minutes trapped in a corner, being talked at by a rich old woman with leathery skin and her much-younger husband. She was part-owner in a casino, he gathered, though he couldn’t be bothered to remember which one. She was drunk and suggestive in a way that would have made most of Jack’s teammates laugh, but only made him want to run.

Through it all, Jack watched Kent. He hoped it wasn’t obvious, but he couldn’t stop. Kent smiled, laughed, flirted. He looked completely in his element. He’d always been more comfortable than Jack with attention, more amused by being surrounded by people, but he’d never been like this. Jack’s memory of him was smaller, fierce and frightened and often saying the wrong thing. What he was watching now was something different, something created by Aces PR. He both hated and admired it.

By the time Jack finally escaped the people trying to get his attention, he knew he needed to find somewhere to hide. He’d tried his best, but he couldn’t keep swallowing the panic in his throat. This was getting out of control. He had to talk to Kaya about some new meds or something. He couldn’t keep doing this. For now, he had to find somewhere to go--having a full panic attack in front of a room full of rich people was a thought more awful than he could stand.

Jack opened one door and then another, moving as quickly as he could away from the sound of voices and laughter and clinking glasses. He eventually found himself in a hotel kitchen. The light was on, but it appeared to be abandoned, with nothing out on the counters and no staff. He sank to the floor, his back against an industrial refrigerator. If anybody came upon him, he’d have to think of an explanation, but for now he just needed to breathe, to tighten his arms around himself and try like hell to stop shaking.

Jack had no idea how long he was there before someone slipped down beside him, but it couldn’t have been very long. He forced himself to look up from where his head was between his knees, knowing he needed to think of a reason he was here. Sick to his stomach, perhaps? He swallowed hard and his eyes found the swimming face next to his.

Kent.

It was as if the noise was all vacuumed out of the room. A clock ticked somewhere. Kent breathed. There was nothing else. Jack couldn’t speak.

Finally, Kent spoke for him. “Still happening, isn’t it?” He didn’t wait for an answer. He just moved around, facing Jack, and covered Jack’s hands, gripping hard at his knees, with his own. “I’m here. I got you.”

Jack shook his head. “You don’t...you’re not…” He couldn’t make the words.

Kent rolled his eyes. “Worry about that later, Zimms. Let me help you now.” He smiled, sad, only one half of his mouth moving. “I know how to do this.”

Jack felt himself nod. He really didn’t have a better option.

“Look at me,” Kent instructed. “Just at my eyes. Breathe in, one-two-three-four. Hold it, one-two-three-four. Breathe out, one-two-three-four.”

Jack did his best to concentrate on Kent’s voice, Kent’s eyes, Kent’s hands where they gripped his. He forced his focus as far down as he could, imagining himself as a tiny figure in the hurricane of his mind, moving slowly toward the light of Kent’s eyes, the sound of Kent’s voice.

They’d established this routine early on. Kent walked in on a panic attack when he and Jack first started rooming together--before they were even really friends. Like he did everything, Kent took it in stride, not afraid, not laughing. It was the first time interference by another person ever helped. Jack’s parents tried, but his mother smothered him and his father made him nervous. Kent just put himself in Jack’s path, solid and calm, and waited until it passed.

This one, Jack though dimly, was taking a long time. By the time he could breathe somewhat normally, his ass and legs were asleep from sitting on the tiled floor. Kent hadn’t moved either, crouched in front of Jack, his face insistently in Jack’s path, his hands still firm on Jack’s knees. He had to be uncomfortable. “There you are,” he said, voice softer than it had been only a moment before. “Good to see you back.”

Jack licked his dry lips and tried to figure out what to say. While he thought about it, Kent got up and looked around the kitchen, finally snagging a glass and filling it with water at the big sink. “Here you go, Zimms. Drink up. Not too fast.”

Jack did as he was told. His mind was still rushing, but he felt calmer every minute. “I’m sorry,” he finally croaked. “You shouldn’t have had to…”

“I didn’t have to.” Kent leaned up against the counter and looked at where Jack was still sitting on the floor. “I never had to. That’s not what this is about.”

“What is it about, Kenny?” Jack’s voice was sharp. The shame of having done this in front of Kent, of having Kent pull him through it, had begun to sink in.

Kent smirked. “Don’t get pissy, Zimmermann. This was nothing I haven’t seen before. You don’t need to feel bad about it.” He sighed. “I was looking for you, because I owe you an apology.”

Jack was silent, so Kent continued. “I said awful shit to you when I saw you last. Shit I didn’t mean. I was...I wanted…” He sighed and pulled a hand through his hair, which immediately stood up in three different places. “Nevermind what I wanted. It wasn’t fair to corner you, and I shouldn’t have said that stuff. I’m sorry.”

Jack was quiet for so long Kent nearly left, pushing away from the counter and starting to stutter out a goodbye, but Jack reached up from the floor and grabbed his wrist, stilling him. “I’m sorry too,” he said softly. “I...I should have called you back. After rehab. At least once. I should have...I should have thanked you. I should have told you.” His voice cracked, which he hated, but there was nothing to do but keep going now. “I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know how to apologize. Guess I still don’t.”

Kent slid back down to the floor, sitting next to Jack with a small groan. “I’d say it was OK, but it wasn’t,” he said. “I was so scared, Zimms. You were so cold…” He shook his head as if he was trying to clear the memory from his eyes. “I’m sorry I didn’t know how to help you.”

Jack sighed. “There wasn’t anything more you could have done.”

They were both quiet. “Are you...OK now?” Kent asked. His voice was tentative, as if he thought Jack might be angry at the question.

“More or less, yeah.” Jack considered. “I still have panic attacks, obviously. But not too often. I still have to be careful. I still have a therapist and meds and stuff. But…” he swallowed. There were some truths he couldn’t tell. How do you give breath to “I don’t want to die anymore?” He went with, “I’m mostly OK now. My life is good.”

Kent nodded. If he was aware of what Jack didn’t say, he didn’t let on. “I’m glad.”

There was so much more, so much they should talk about, so much they wouldn’t. Not tonight, on a hotel kitchen floor, and maybe not ever. But this was a start Jack hadn’t ever expected. His best hope had been to get out of Vegas without making a fool of himself, with embarrassing himself in front of anybody. That hadn’t happened--he was definitely embarrassed--but this way was better, maybe. He looked at the man next to him, the man who grew from the boy he loved and hated and feared so intensely, and he was glad to be here. It was harder this way, but Jack was beginning to learn that loving people was worth the complication.

“How about you?” Jack looked at Kent with what he hoped was a smile. It was hard to tell what his face was doing sometimes. “You seem good. You’re playing great hockey.”

Kent smiled. It was his real smile, crooked and a little bit goofy, not the half-smile half-smirk he’d perfected for the press. “Zimms, I am not playing good hockey,” he said. “I am playing fucking GREAT hockey.”

Jack laughed. Kent wasn’t wrong. Kent also wasn’t answering the real question, but Jack let him get away with it.

**Author's Note:**

> Please come visit me on [Tumblr](https://coffeewithconsequences.tumblr.com/) or read the rest of my fic here at [Archive of Our Own](http://archiveofourown.org/users/CoffeeWithConsequences/works)!


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